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Page 55
Masters was very guarded.
"It's not for me to pass an opinion, Sir Walter. But the reverend
gentleman, no doubt, understands such things. Only there's the
Witch of Endor, if I may mention the creature, she fetched up more
than she bargained for. And I remember a proverb as I heard in
India, from a Hindoo. I've forgot the lingo now, but I remember
the sense. They Hindoos say that if you knock long enough at a
closed door, the devil will open it--excuse my mentioning such a
thing; but Hindoos are awful wise."
"And what then, Masters? I know not who may open the door of this
mystery; but this I know, that, in the Name of the Most High God,
I can face whatever opens it."
"I ain't particular frightened neither, your reverence," said
Masters. "But I wouldn't chance it alone, being about average
sinful and not near good enough to tackle that unknown horror hid
up there single-handed. I'd chance it, though, in high company
like yours. And that's something."
"It is, Masters, and much to your credit," declared Sir Walter.
"For that matter, I would do the like. Indeed, I am willing to
accompany Mr. May."
While Septimus May shook his head and Mary trembled, the butler
spoke again.
"But there's nobody else in this house would. Not even Fred
Caunter, who doesn't know the meaning of fear, as you can testify,
Sir Walter. But he's fed up with the Grey Room, if I may say so,
and so's the housekeeper, Mrs. Forbes, and so's Jane Bond. Not
that they would desert the ship; but there's others that be going
to do so. I may mention that four maids and Jackson intend to give
notice to-morrow. Ann Maine, the second housemaid, has gone
to-night. Her father fetched her. Excuse me mentioning it, but
Mrs. Forbes will give you the particulars to-morrow, if you please."
"Hysteria," declared Sir Walter. "I don't blame them. It is
natural. Everybody is free to go, if they desire to do so. But
tell them what you have heard to-night, Masters. Tell them that
no good Christian need fear to rest in peace. Explain that Mr. May
will presently enter the Grey Room in the name of God; and bid them
pray on their knees for him before they go to sleep."
Masters hesitated.
"All the same, I very much wish the reverend gentleman would give
Scotland Yard a chance. If they fall, then he can wipe their eye
after--excuse my language, Sir Walter. I've read a lot about the
spirits, being terrible interested in 'em, as all human men must
be; and I hear that running after 'em often brings trouble. I
don't mean to your life, Sir Walter, but to your wits. People get
cracked on 'em and have to be locked up. I stopped everybody
frightening themselves into 'sterics at dinner to-day; but you
could see how it took 'em; and, whether or no, I do beg Mr. May to
be so kind as to let me sit up along with him to-night.
"You never hear of two people getting into trouble with these here
customers, and while he was going for this blackguard ghost in the
name of the Lord, I could keep my weather eye lifting for trouble.
'Tis a matter for common sense and keeping your nerve, in my
opinion, and we don't want another death on our hands, I suppose.
There'll be half the mountebanks and photograph men and newspaper
men in the land here to-morrow, and 'twill take me all my time to
keep 'em from over-running the house. Because if they could come
in their scores for the late captain--poor gentleman!--what won't
they try now this here famous detective has been done in?"
"Henry deplored the same thing," said Mary. "And I answer again,
as I answered then," replied Septimus May. "You mean well, Sir
Walter, and your butler means well; but you propose an act in
direct opposition to the principle that inspires me."
"What do you expect to happen?" asked Mary. "Do you suppose you
will see something, and that something will tell you what it is,
and why it killed dear Tom?"
"That, at any rate, would be a very great blessing to the living,"
said her father.
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